The Culture of Research and Learning

Dear Murtaza,



Thank you for a good read. It was thought provoking.



Pmishra,



Expletives deleted.



Umer M.

ijaz_gul #1: ``The college that I run has an exclusive Research and Development Department for both undergraduate and post graduate students.``

Which college do you run? And what is the field of R&D that it concentrates on...

I think Pakistan`s main problem is faculty retention and attraction. The students are there, the buildings are there, or can be built. But where will the faculty come from? Actually the Pakistani faculty is there also, but it is all abroad. The govt. needs to figure out how to get these people back.

The answer is economics. Money. You have to pay them what they are worth in the international market. LUMS pays salaries in the lakhs of ruppees, with all kinds of facilities. So it has faculty. Other institutions have to do the same.

Medical colleges in Pakistan seem to have a lot of well-qualified faculty. Even though setting up medical colleges is far far more difficult than setting up, say, an IT university. However, (I think) medical college faculties make a lot of money in private practice as doctors. And there stature as a professor helps their business. Hence a lot of highly qualified faculty there. I know a lot of surgeons and highly qualified doctors in Pakistan. I hardly know an CS Ph.Ds who live in Pakistan.

Once the faculty is there, then, Ph.D. programs need to be started locally. Once enough Ph.Ds have graduated locally, the faculty requirements will go down, since while many of the local Ph.Ds. will go abroad, but many will stay also. Like what happens in India.

For starters, I think maybe it is a good idea to concentrate on the wealthy. This may sound odd. But that is where the money is. I read somewhere that Pakistan sends the 9th or so highest number of students to the USA for degrees. These students and their families send millions of dollars of foreign exchange into foreign universities and economies. If there were enough LUMS type institutions in Pakistan, regardless of how much they charged as fees, at least the money would stay in Pakistan. And they would recruit more professors and do more research locally. Granted it would only be available to the rich Pakistanis, but still, it is better than sending it all abroad.

Once those rich kids graduate and do local Ph.Ds. they would get involved in the local ecnonomy (many would go abroad also), and would link it up with local universities. Much like rich kids who graduate from Stanford do. At the very least, just the fees they spend locally, would allow local private universities to grow.

The second step is to find the highest paying govt. job in Pakistan, and link the benefits of Ph.D professors with that job. To the best of my knowledge, the most looked after govt. servant in Pakistan is the captain of a 747 in PIA. He lives like a king. If the govt. can pay him so much, with awesome facilities, obviously it has some money. This is despite the fact that PIA has been running in a loss for ages (till this year).

If the govt. can pay its airline pilots so much, it can do so for well-qualified university professors, also. After all, having some experience in both areas, it is much more difficult to be a researcher than to be a pilot........

Murtaza,

Your article raises some valid points. I guess, comparing campuses or grants with the North American giants seems rather unrealistic. We also can not forget the financial and ever-unstable political situation of our country.

I recall reading a concerned article or two by Professor Pervez Hoodbhoy regarding the situation faced by our Academic Institutions and the lack of proper teaching staff. Some effort by the current government has been made through `Foreign Faculty Hiring Program`
http://www.hec.gov.pk/hec2/htmls/faculty.htm
Though this might seem a step in the right direction, I`m not sure, how well these packages would appeal to foreign faculty. They probably have better research opportunities, wherever they are. Plus, they can rely on the government not changing and the new government not revoking their contracts.

Your concerns regarding funding for research & development aren`t ill-founded. I believe we as a nation need to prioritize education on all levels, instead of increasing the defence budget among other things. Unfortunately, I agree with malik99`s realistic perspective on R&D being a matter of economics.

Here is yet another irrelevant trash on chowk. It would have been helpful if any one has pointed out that generals in the pak military are given a Mercedes 550, and is consistant with the values of pakistan. The military also supporot the nadrassas consistant with the creation values of pakistan.
It ois pathetic to see pakistanis going on a tangent on institutions of other countries with out caring to admitt the reality of pakistan.

re: this article
There is no doubt that western civilization leads the world by research. Research produces innovations and patents which are carefully safeguarded. This is one way West shows its monopoly over the rest of the world.
I did my fellowship from an University whose annual NIH grant amounted to more than 300 million dollars! I am just talking of one university here.
While India and Pak cannot hope to catch up with the west for a long time to come, they can start research into areas that are of vital interest to them.
For eg why is there no research into newer ways of combating malaria, TB? Why no research into newer and better ways of population control? I used to hear of some research into a male fertility vaccine by AIIMS, Delhi sometime in the past but this seems to have fizzled out.
I just learned the news that India has test flown an indegenously built Light aircraft called saras. One wonders why this is so important. Indians need research into areas like Agriculture (better ways of harvesting, arid farming etc), water conservation, Infection control etc.
Indiscriminate use of antibiotics in Madras (even 15 years ago when i was an MD student there) had resulted in resistance to commonly used antibiotics like Chloramphenicol for typhoid. This is tragic. Research into newer antibiotics is costly and is monopolised by the west. After the WTO agreement, both India and Pak will have to pay a price soon for taking patents for granted.
Research in South Asia should be geared to the population needs, given the limited resources. One can make a beginning by fostering peace and diverting scant resources away from miltary use and towards the needs of the community. This is a big task.
Really speaking, both India and Pak are in the same league and are nowhere near the competence of the West in research.
Sridhar

Disgusting. when you bark with dogs, you become a dog too.
Cheerios

pmishra2

You seem to have hit pakis where its hurts the most. :) :) Look at this Umer Murkhaza guy - he is going bananas - like a chimp on steroids.

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Omar and Umer

You guys may throw sissy fits at what PMishra wrote. Your sense of outrage is understandable. But here`s the rub. Pakistani leaders and intellectuals will continue to focus not on research and education but on the issues PMishra identified.

If you worked to change that focus with as much vehemence as you displayed in your replies to PMishra, Pakistan herself may create a few McGills. Now THAT will be a real response to people like PMishra and me.

[Universities in the developing countries are in dire need of support from the society. Likewise, researchers need the “support of a society and culture that values education.”]

I agree with the premise of your argument, but somehow I disagree with the direction it may end up taking. Just valuing education is not enough. In my opinion, it`s completely useless if you do not have enough avenues to utilize your energies. Also, your suggestions at the end are quite constructive but they are based on a few assumptions. Those unspelled out assumptions are real important for the creation of a tradition-free, healthy, progressive and civil society.

[The government plays an important role in promoting philanthropy by offering tax exemptions to individuals and firms, who donate resources to public causes. These incentives have promoted the tradition of philanthropy. For instance, by donating a database for research, a private firm can claim tax exemption for the fair market value of its donation. ]

In order to reach up to that level, the government ought to be stable, civil, farsighted and healthy.

UmerM: You can certainly add a lot to the current topic, ``The Culture of Research & Learning.`` You`d be an excellent candidate to speak on ``Civil Behavior.``

pmishra

you hit where it hurts pakistanis the most.

haha.. jalne ke baad ka smoke to dekho...!!

O GOD! i am rolling.

I would actually want the author to answer the question raised by #1 ijaz_gul.

I feel there are basically two problems.

a. The problems mentioned of funding, on a sustainable basis, can only be solved through state intervention- responsible patronage and support. History has proved it for us- world`s best academies and R&D institutes have been rooted in state support and patronage, period. Let`s stop trying to reinvent the wheel. If you have a NGO-like approach to education, you end up like- as #1 pointed out- beggars.

b. The other problem, that I feel is much more grave. For those of you who still haven`t read Mr. Hoodbhoy`s excellent article ``Why didn`t the Scientific Revolution Happen in Islam``, in a word here lies the problem: attitude. Until our society has `utilitarian` attitude towards academics, all that it will produce is coaching centers and not Universities or R&D.

{A few hundred households can pool resources to set-up one hundred research chairs at local universities while respective governments can offer incentives by modifying the tax code.}

If you think people will pool in for universities or r&d, think again, think better...

Regards
Bilal

P.S. Hoodbhoy`s article can be found at: http://chowk.com/show_article.cgi?aid=00000104&channel=university%20ave&start=0&end=9&page=1&chapter=1

umermutraza -- yaar chor -- yeh sala bhot bara loser hai -- he already made quite a fool of himself by his irrelevant and silly post -- zahra mind telling us how this guys sarcasm is `appropriate` here

pmishra man you`re prob hell`s biggest loser -- get a life moron

I am not sure whether it makes any sense to compare research in North America to anything going on in Pakistan. They are in two different leagues. Comparisons should be made with countries like Iran, etc. Hence this article just points to the obvious, i.e. North America is way ahead of Pakistan. What is more important is to highlight how to improve research in Pakistan, keeping in mind the financial and political limitations.

In fact, one cannot even compare Canada and USA. USA is in a different league. Having now worked in both places, and recruited from universities in Canada, I have to say, that at least in IT, very little of Canada`s cream stays in Canada. It all goes to the USA. I worked with more top level technical Canadian talent in the USA, than I have in Canada.

Invariably, all the top technical talent (chief architects, lead engineers etc.) that we have ended up hiring on projects here are from places like China, India, Pakistan, Iran, Russia etc. Not Canada born Canadians. I am, in fact, quite disappointed in the talent pool out of Canada`s top universities in this area, that remains in Canada. They are nowhere near the stuff that comes out of the MITs and Stanfords.

The only reason Canada`s IT industry is running is because of the Chinese immigrants, who fill in the technical positions. Top level executive talent in IT here is very poor, since immigrants cannot fill those positions. Phenomenally poor. I have met quite a few CIOs and VPs, in the IT industry here, and very few of them here know what the hell they are doing. Many are completely clueless (the ones from India or Pakistan etc. are quite good, though). While in the USA, those positions, are manned (and wommaned) by very talented people.

The point about the universities being good is correct. McGill, U of T, Waterloo etc. are definitely good universities. As good as the good one in the USA. But, at least in IT, their contribution to the Canadian industry isn`t even close to what it should be, in term of human resources. Skoll being a good example. Why didn`t he he build Ebay in Canada?

Canada has done well in networking with Nortel and JDS Uniphase (which I believe is now in USA). But in software, its biggest company is Cognos, which could be swallowed by Ebay, easily.

As far as Pakistan is concerned, it needs to invest heavily in universities. The main shortage is of skilled faculty. U of T has over 80 Ph.Ds. in their IT faculty. While Pakistan probably doesn`t have 80 Ph.Ds in IT in the whole country. They will only come back from abroad, if you give them a lot of money. Which universities like LUMS do. But few others, do. If PIA pilots can be paid lakhs and lakhs of ruppees, with huge amount of facilities, then why can`t Ph.Ds. in computer science be given the same packages?

Much of the creation of Silicon Valley can be attributed to the location of Stanford and Berkeley in the area. Those universities have paid back hundreds of times the money invested in them........Two or three more NUSTs, and LUMS would serve Pakistan well.....After that people may start donating things to the universities, and a trend may start...

Anyways, an article with good intentions. But I don`t know if it presents any valuable solutions.........